Monday, June 17, 2013

'Thank You For Your Service, Mr. Snowden'

By Ilana Mercer

A heroic American whistleblower chooses, oh-so wisely, to expose Uncle Sam’s usurpations to the veteran reporters of the British Guardian and not to the partisan hacks of the American press. This fact tells you all you need to know about US presstitutes.

Confirmation of the degree to which American media has been co-opted by power came on June 10, again, via a British newspaper. The Mail Online divulged that Edward Snowden had "first approached the Washington Post with his leaks but the newspaper refused to comply with his publishing demands."

You see, the Washington Post had to hotfoot it back to Big Brother Obama before it would do its journalistic due diligence. "The Post broke the story on PRISM two weeks later, on Thursday, after consulting with government officials," confirmed the Mail Online.

Even after being scooped by the Guardian, the Obama embeds at the Washington Post saw fit to inform their readers about PRISM on a purely need-to-know basis, "reprinting only four of the 41 PRISM PowerPoint slides," and generally misrepresenting the nature of the program known as PRISM. The manufactured-in-America version of PRISM thus contradicts the "internal NSA documents" leaked to the Guardian.

According to the guardian of American freedoms at the Guardian, reporter Glenn Greenwald, the 41-slide PowerPoint presentation he acquired from Snowden has been authenticated as a document "used to train intelligence operatives on the capabilities of the program." The presentation, pictorials with captions, handed out by the National Security Agency, boasts of having "direct access to the systems of Google, Facebook, Apple, Yahoo, PalTalk, YouTube in 2010; Skype and AOL, and other servers."

Contrary to what you're being told, "the world's largest surveillance organization" can and does "obtain targeted communications without having to request them from the service providers and without having to obtain individual court orders." And it is contrary to the Bill of Rights, the Fourth Amendment to the Constitution, in particular. It specifies that “warrants shall issue” only “upon probable cause, supported by oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.”

Tellingly, the tools of Big Media and big government are not apprising you of these facts. Like a tortoise in its shell they've retreated from the watersheds that are the AP, the IRS and the NSA scandals, informing you only of what New York and Northeast elites think is important: "Most of you still like Obama."

In light of “the disclosure that the federal authorities routinely collect data on phone calls Americans make, regardless of whether they have any bearing on a counterterrorism investigation,” the Gray Lady endeavored, fleetingly, to shake off a flea or two, and adopt a slightly less reverential tone toward the godhead Obama. The New York Times quickly lay down with dogs again; the paper rushed to restore Obama's bona fides the following day.

As to other "nimble" minds in media: Andrea Tarantula, one of the interchangeable females on a Fox News idiot's extravaganza called “The Five,” said that, "If they are competent with my information; they can have it. If not, let me have my freedoms back."

To Andrea (who is, admittedly, not as invincibly stupid as the statist Dana Perino), the inviolable "right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures" is subject to the efficiency of a naturally illicit search.

Not for Greg Gutfeld are arguments from principle. Sitting in for Bill O'Reilly, Gutfeld declared that "this" was not about surveillance but about a progressive government that could not be trusted. The majority of Americans are equally adrift, oblivious to the individual liberties American Constitution makers bequeathed them. The individuals questioned by the polling professionals at the Pew Research Center were inclined to approve of the phone-call tapping of millions, if conducted by the party for which they voted.

Lawrence O'Donnell and his entourage at MSNBC—Alex Wagner and Chris Hayes, the most enthusiastic Obama bobbleheads on TV—acted all surprised about rudderless America, never implicating their daily, partisan promotionals in the process. The hosts harped on the fact that no harm had come from the NSA PRISM program. And, after all, was Obama not obligated to continue the incursions into liberty begun by Bush? C'est la vie. Wagner did display a modicum of remorse for her cover-up. She admitted that Obama had gone beyond the call of duty in expanding counterterrorism and state surveillance.

Neoconservatives such as Bill Kristol of the Weekly Standard and the editorial board of the Wall Street Journal; retired United States Army Lt. Col. Ralph Peters, and radio talker Hugh Hewitt—all pronounced the NSA data sweep a non-scandal. Another neocon, Charles Krauthammer, saw Obama's infractions as a vindication of Bush's. The columnist invited Democrats now excusing Obama to pardon Bush and ... party on.

Snowden came forth, in his words, "to reveal criminality." But Fox News' Megyn Kelly chose to mine crime from the ore of virtue. Kelly summoned a two-bit profiler, allegedly from the FBI's Behavioral Analysis Unit—who sounded like she’d been plucked from the set of Criminal Minds—to expose "this guy." Not to be outperformed by Kelly, the profiler unloaded terms like "loser" and "drop-out" on a man who has held many responsible positions within the intelligence community in his young life.

Yet another Fox News personality, Neil Cavuto, went on to compare Snowden to celebrity seducer Roman Polanski, who, in 1978, sought asylum in France after being convicted of sleeping with an American minor. Chimed Cavuto, "We don't know why [Snowden] did what he did."

Oh yes we do. Contra Cavuto, Snowden forsook creature comforts and worldly possessions to speak truth to power—and not to any power. The 29-year-old National Security Agency contractor has gone up "against the world's most powerful intelligence agencies," as he stated soberly. Snowden understands his chances of prevailing are not good. "[T]ey're such powerful adversaries that no one can meaningfully oppose them. If they want to get you, they will get you in time."

In Snowden's poignant words, "You can’t wait around for someone else to act. I had been looking for leaders, but I realized that leadership is about being the first to act.” "I'm neither traitor nor hero. I’m an American," he summed-up so simply.

Yes, we need fewer personalities like Cavuto and more men of character like Snowden.

Those who're not suspended in the moral abyss with mainstream media already know that Edward Snowden is the best of America. Let us prove ourselves worthy of his sacrifice.

Come every Memorial Day—more aptly called "Dying For Nothing Day"—we direct a commonplace saying at members of a military that has not defended authentic American liberties for decades. It is, however, to a young man such as this that we should say: